Millcreek schools prioritize capital projects

The Millcreek School Board finds itself trying to answer an interesting question: How to best spend $20 million?

The School Board is shaping a priority list of capital projects in an effort to decide how to spend the money, left over from a $25 million bond issue originally meant to fund a $100 million-plus school consolidation plan.

Topping the list: an $8 million to $9 million effort to renovate science labs at McDowell Senior High School and McDowell Intermediate High School and a $3 million project to replace windows at McDowell Senior High School.

Millcreek schools Superintendent William Hall also hopes to spend about $2.5 million on various electrical, mechanical and plumbing projects at McDowell Senior High School. Another $1.5 million is pegged for general construction and $750,000 for turf replacement at Gus Anderson Field.

The timeline is tight: Hall said he hopes to have those and other projects complete in time for the start of the 2014-15 school year in August.

"It's going to be a busy place," Hall said.

Some of the projects have been put out for bid. Hall said he hopes to be able to award some bids at the School Board's Feb. 24 meeting, scheduled for 7 p.m. at the Millcreek Education Center, 3740 W. 26th St.

Science labs at both schools are a top priority, he said.

"When I first got here, I heard about the science labs and that they need to be updated, and here we are almost four, five years later, and we're still talking about updating the science labs," Hall said. "We just need to have state-of-the-art facilities and labs for our kids."

The $20 million is left over from a bond originally floated to fund a planned consolidation of McDowell Senior and Intermediate High Schools, a project that eventually was scuttled amid concerns about the state of the district's finances. The money is separate from the district's general budget and earmarked for construction purposes only.

The need to improve the schools is evident, board President Judy Wheaton said. Some of the projects being discussed were identified years ago, she said.

"The facility should complement the curriculum, not guide the curriculum," Wheaton said. "You end up saying we can't offer chemistry because we don't have a chemistry lab. You can't have curriculum squashed and hampered simply because the facility doesn't meet students' academic needs.

"When we look at things, we have to say, 'What can we do that not only provides safety and security ... but also, what's going to address the academic needs of our students?'"

ERICA ERWIN can be reached at 870-1846 or by e-mail. Follow her on Twitter at twitter.com/ETNerwin.